Sustainable Living February

This blog has always been about living life in a mindful and intentional way, for me this means that most of the decisions we make have been thought about carefully, even if we decide to continue as we are a decision has still been made.  When we take a product from a shelf in a shop or tap a button on a screen, should we stop and think about how it has got this point before we do so?  It can be hard to make decisions over many aspects of our lives, we are often far removed from the means of production and it can be hard to find out how this operates.  Maybe we shouldn't be thinking is there a more sustainable replacement for something, rather do we really need it at all?

To help me keep on track I have come up with some words that I will be using to keep my decision making mindful and intentional, and my life in general as sustainable as I can make it.  If you you want to join me you would be most welcome, either using the same words for inspiration or your own that are more meaningful to you.  These are the words (you can read my thoughts behind some of them here) that I been using in February.

Nourish

It never ceases to amaze that the busier I am the more I seem to be able to fit into my days.  A certain teenage boy is always hungry in this house, homemade snacks are more nourishing and usually healthier than bought ones so I have been doing a lot more baking this month.  The kitchen often looks a whirlwind has been through when I do this as I make use of the oven being on and do it whilst I am also cooking our evening meal.  I do love the smell of a biscuit cooking, it is a particular isn't it?  Alice decided she wanted to get on the act and made us all some delicious shortbread, she needed a little help with some of the words in the recipe - reading is a work in progress for her - but none with the cooking.  I am so glad that she loves to spend time in the kitchen.  I now have a supply of muffins in the freezer which can be eaten with soup (savoury ones) or for breakfast with fruit and yogurt.  I am hoping that I can continue to maintain this supply throughout the year.

The baking has also been a distraction for me as I struggle with the contents of our veg box at this time of year.  When the root veggies make their appearance in the autumn I am always glad as I do love them, but five months on and they are starting to loose their appeal.  I am ready for when the spring vegetables start appearing.

Lessen

We bought ourselves a new bed in January, it was bigger than the old one which meant new bedding. It was time for me to go through the old bedding and repurpose or re home some of it.  A friend was in need of some new bedding so she had most of it but one of the duvet covers had several small holes, not suitable for re homing so it was turned into two pillowcases and rag cloths useful for mopping up those messes that you don't want to use the dish cloth for.

I have read a lot about microfibre recently, how it sheds tiny fibres into the water stream, fibres so tiny that they pass through any processing and stay in the water, washing out in our water courses and eventually in to the sea.  I have been replacing all our microfibre cloths this month either with the rag or knitted ones, I had a small stash of the knitted ones so it was a quick replacement.  I have another on the needles and will knit up a few more so that I have a constant supply in between washes.

I also did some repairing this month and cleared my darning pile.  I had a few cloth shopping bags which had seams coming apart and my husband had worn a hole in a pair of his cycling trousers.  They are all patched up and back in use once again.

Thankful

My country has been battered by storms this month, we seemed to have had a near constant weather warning in place for either rain, wind or snow.  The water supply in my village was off for nearly a week, a main supply pipe had burst and took some time to repair the dreadful weather making it an even more difficult task.  I am so grateful and thankful that we were only inconvenienced by these events rather than having our life turned upside down by flooding, my heart goes out to those who have been.  I am so thankful that I have a warm, safe place to call home as this time of year.

Create

I always seem to do more making and creating at this time of year, it goes hand in hand with hibernating.  Alice's tunic is finished, and she has been enjoying its warmth.  My socks are finally complete, they have taken at least three years I think!  I now have three pairs of hand knit socks, I started the year with one pair so maybe this could be the year of sock knitting for me.

A friend who is moving house and having clear out bought a big bag of fabric she no longer wanted to a group I host, I selected amongst other things a piece that I thought I could make into a simple skirt for Alice.  I sewed it together to make a tube, turned over the hem and made a tube for elastic round the waist.  It took me a couple of hours, I already had elastic in my sewing box and the fabric was free, perfect!  I have also started making a linen skirt for myself, I found a piece of linen in a charity shop and loved the colour.  I have washed it and cut out the pieces now it needs sewing together.

Sanctuary

After writing about the importance of sanctuary in my life I realised that I wanted to include it in this round up. Being sustainable is more than our awareness and actions that preserve the beauty of nature and Mother Earth, it is about looking after ourselves too, looking after our health, and well being keeps us sustainable.  My sanctuary this month has been time spent outside.  I have managed at least one good long walk each week and every time it has been the rare occasions that there has been dry moments , I seem to have done well to have achieved this especially when most of the walks were planned in advance as I was joined by friends.  The weather has been so wild and unpredictable this month that these moments outside have been all the more special especially when they have been with nourishing company.

Learn

The state of our climate is in the media all the time now.  Whilst it is good that it is on the agenda and being talked about like never before, some of what is being reported is worrying.  I have read recently that some people are experiencing climate anxiety.  There is a huge pressure on all of us to see climate issues as our individual problem, that it is the up to the individual to change their lifestyle. Whilst there is some merit in us being mindful of our personal choices this is a huge weight for any of us to take on and has the potential to take a huge toll on our well being.  It shouldn't be just about the individual, coming together with other people either in real life or online to support each other, perhaps, if it is something we are comfortable with, demanding radical change through organised protests .  We need to praise each other for any success however small that may seem, lots of small steps add up to big changes over time.  I heard an interesting analogy recently which seems like an unusual one but it made so much sense to me.  It related smoking to climate change, bear with me I have not gone mad.  We knew as early as the 60s that there was a link between smoking and lung cancer, it wasn't until the 80s that research was published on the effects of passive smoking, in that same decade smoking was banned on underground trains, advertising was banned in 1997, you could smoke on planes until the early 90s, you could smoke in pubs and restaurants until 2006 and in enclosed public spaces until a year later (this is all in the UK). It took a long time for these changes to be made, could we have imagined back in the 70s that we would be where we are now?  People smoked everywhere then, nowadays you rarely see smokers in public places. I have realised that we need to think the same way about climate change, we can make changes to public perception, behaviour and law, it won't happen overnight but we need to continue to think that we can.

Fun

You are probably going to think I have completely lost the plot when you read about what I enjoyed the most this month.  Cameron and I have been doing quite a bit of conservation work at a local nature reserve owned by a wildlife trust.  We signed up for a few days this month and for one of them we were putting up an electric fence around a area where we had previously planted several thousand plugs of wild flowers.  It sounds like a job that shouldn't have taken all day but it did.  The area we were fencing was half way up a steep hill, we had a quad bike and trailer to get all the equipment up there, the ground was very wet to cut a long story short we ended up carrying most the stuff up the hill and we encountered several other problems including persistent rain and biting winds.  Somehow none of it mattered, we had such fun as group thrown together by our desire to get the job done which we did.  

Thank you once again for reading through this very long post.  I realise that it may seem that I do an awful lot, I suspect you do to, if you were to write it all down like I have here.  You are most welcome to join me, either use the same words or your own which mean more to you, let me know in the comments below and I will head over and have a read.  I will post my Sustainable Living March roundup on Thursday 2nd April.